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Conservative leader Kemi Badenoch will on Wednesday attempt to shake off a race row that has gripped her party conference with a speech focused on the economy and a promise to drive down Britain’s deficit.
Badenoch will seek to carve out a niche for the Conservatives as the party of spending control in contrast to what Tory officials claim are the “fantasy economics” of Nigel Farage’s Reform UK.
The Tory leader claims she could save £47bn a year through cuts to areas such as welfare, overseas aid and the civil service, although not all of the savings would be used to cut Britain’s debt.
Under what Badenoch will call “a golden rule” for a future Tory government, half of reductions to public spending would be used to pay down the deficit while the other half would go to “cutting taxes or spending to boost the economy”.
Badenoch’s closing speech to the Tory conference in Manchester comes as she is under huge pressure to assert her authority over her party.
In a sign of the pressure she is under, a new YouGov poll put the Tories on 17 points, in joint third place with the Liberal Democrats, with Labour on 20 and Reform UK on 27. Badenoch on Tuesday ruled out a deal with Farage, saying there would be “definitely no pact with Reform”.
Preparations for her speech were overshadowed by remarks by Robert Jenrick, shadow justice secretary and a leadership rival, in which he said he had not seen “another white face” on a recent visit to Handsworth in Birmingham.
Badenoch insisted she supported Jenrick, who was expressing concerns about the lack of integration in Handsworth. His remarks from March were revealed in a recording published by The Guardian.
The Tory leader has taken a tough stance on migration — including calling on Britain to leave the European Convention on Human Rights to speed up the removal of failed asylum seekers — but her speech on Wednesday was being billed by her allies as “a pivot” to the economy.
“Every pound we save will be put to work,” she will say. “At least half will go towards cutting the deficit, because living within our means is our first priority. And with the rest, we are going to get our economy growing again and bring down the taxes stifling our economy.”
Badenoch believes Britain could be heading for a debt crisis under the Labour government and that voters will again see the Tories as a bastion of sound economic management, in spite of the fallout from Liz Truss’s chaotic and shortlived premiership in 2022.
She will also set out plans to dramatically reduce the numbers of young people going to university by reintroducing caps on what she will call “rip-off” degrees.
A Conservative government would allocate funding to universities based on course quality and graduate earnings across all subjects — including creative arts, languages and sports science, she will say.
The party estimates the policy would cut about 100,000 university places per year by the end of the next parliament, saving more than £3bn annually in student loan write-offs and enabling the doubling of the apprenticeship budget to £6bn.
Badenoch will say: “Nearly one in three graduates see no economic return, and every year taxpayers are writing off over £7bn in unpaid student loans.”
The announcement drew criticism from across the education sector. Nick Hillman, director of the Higher Education Policy Institute think-tank, said: “Badenoch should know that it is not wise to stand in the way of people’s aspirations to better themselves by obtaining degrees — in the same way as she and I both did.”
A spokesperson for Universities UK, which represents the higher education sector, said: “Everyone wants a more prosperous Britain. For that, we’re going to need more graduates, not fewer.”
Meanwhile, Farage announced on Tuesday that 20 councillors were joining Reform from the Tories, a move dismissed by Badenoch as “a stunt”.
Since making sweeping victories in May’s local elections, Reform has almost 900 councillors across the country, 81 of whom have defected from the Tories.
“We have to win back our voters who have switched to Reform,” said one shadow cabinet member. “We have to show them respect and you don’t do that by spending all your time slagging off Farage.”
